Doctor Zhivago | Boris Pasternak | Pasternak v. Reader, Round II

Doctor Zhivago | Boris Pasternak | Doctor Zhivago, Love and the Russian Revolution

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Doctor Zhivago

	Doctor Zhivago Boris Pasternak Pantheon, 1997 - 592 pages average customer review:based on 80 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

n celebration of the 40th anniversary of its original publication, here is the only paperback edition now available of the classic story of the life and loves of a poet/physician during the turmoil of the Russian Revolution.

Pasternak v. Reader, Round II

My first reading of Dr. Zhivago was in high school. At 15, the book was a chore. Impenetrable and numerous Russian names (often for the same character) and endless description of the Russian landscape left me exhausted and unimpressed. After rereading and enjoying a few other high school assignments, I came across Dr. Zhivago on my bookshelf and wondered if I would find more appreciation for Mr. Pasternak's novel ten years later.

Yes, I did. And no, I didn't.

I found that this time around I had something more of a connection with the characters. I better understood the way that life can pull a person in strange directions and drop them into unexpected and unwanted situations. I understood that sometimes people are swept into and out of the place they want to be - and why they stay where things are bad and leave where things are good. I certainly had a far greater appreciation for Pasternak's obviously loving descriptions of his homeland.

That said, the things that drove my dislike of Dr. Zhivago the first time were still still there. The sprawling story and unending task of keeping all the characters straight were still a detraction. I don't know if the problem with character names springs from the fact that, being Russian names, they are unfamiliar to my mind or if Pasternak simply failed to rein in his cast of thousands. Unresolved plot lines rarely bother me but, when combined with extensive background on what ending up being minor characters, Dr. Zhivago felt a bit as if Pasternak let the narrative get away from him. Maybe that was the point. Sometimes life just gets away from you. After all, he's the one with a Nobel Prize. Who am I to criticize?

While I actually liked the novel this time, I feel as if I should have liked Dr. Zhivago more than I did. Maybe it's that I can't escape my first impression.

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Doctor Zhivago, Love and the Russian Revolution

I've never been to Russia, but poet Boris Pasternak made me feel as if I could see with my very own eyes the long beautiful snow covered hills of the country side and the beauty of Moscow before and still during the hardships of the Russian Revolution. The novel begins with Pasternak depriving the Zhivago family of their wealth and sets the reader up for the coming Revolution. The story of Doctor Zhivago to some is an unforgettable love story while to others the account of the consequences of the revolution with its crimes, starvation, epidemics and war.

The poet/physician Doctor Zhivago, Yuri Andreievich, is the main character who the reader follows before and through the Revolution up to the end of the book. The reader also learns of Tonia, Lara and some other friends during the first chapters as Pasternak shows the different worlds they come from, explaining the different classes and hardships associated with them.

Yuri who grows up in Moscow, with the Gromeko family, later marries their child Tonia. Lara marries Pavel Antipov, Pasha, who goes to war. Incidentally, Lara and Zhivago meet while in serving at the military sites with the wounded. After the war, Zhivago and his family move to the country side near the city of Yuriatin. The story continues as Zhivago, who is evidently madly in love with Lara meets with her in Yuriatin and they begin their affair. One day as he is returning back to Tonia, supposedly with the intentions of never seeing Lara again, he is kidnapped by the Partisans who keep him as their doctor during the Civil War.

These are some of the events that occur during the course of the book, ones that are memorable but also ones that are hard to understand and get into. Boris Pasternak included many minor characters within his book, ones that seem almost insignificant to the actual plot and make the reader question their presence. Because of the little development and poor prose it is hard to become truly attached to any of the characters. He also has a tendency to include overly descriptive details at times.

Many question the greatness of the love Zhivago really deemed to have had. If he really had that love for not only Tonia but Lara as well why did he approach the different situations in his life the way he did? This was one of the reasons you want to keep turning the pages to find out what happens to Zhivago, what he will do and how he will do it.

That's not to say that the ending of the book does not bring some disappointment to the reader. It rather unfinished with the character development with the reader hoping Zhivago had approached his life differently so that the book could really end as a love story. However, the underlying theme next to the love are the individuals responses to the circumstances that are beyond the familiar experiences. Although Boris Pasternak used some philosophy that was a bit convoluted the book was fairly easy to understand. The hardships and crimes of the Russian Revolution, and the Civil War leave are distressing and moving.

Overall I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to read a classic, perhaps its being so broken apart and with so many different details, situations and characters makes it relatable to life. The fact that it is written by a poet can be seen with the beautiful poems and descriptions that leave one with a clear picture in their mind

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Love and Revolution

"Doctor Zhivago" by Boris Pasternak, © 1957, 1958, 1958

Quite the love story. It is sad, and a lot is made of the Russian Revolution, as is right. The times were in turmoil and it affected everyone. It is to be noted that the same events are happening in Iraq today: factions fighting factions; injustice and terrorism are treated as if just and right because the perpetrators are a part of some group that thinks so; etc.
This is really a soap opera. People live their lives and have troubles, solve problems, create heartache and what not, just like we do in real life. The story does not deal in psychology, so a few times the choices of the characters are truly left to your own intuition and understanding of human nature. Some of the philosophy spouted by these people gets a bit esoteric and convoluted, by and large, it is understandable, just a bit odd to read in a literary story.
As I read the book, I began to feel as if, if I tried, I could see Lara as a microcosm for Russian peasants. They were violated young, treated all right for a time, left to their own resources, on and on, up through the Russian Revolution. Maybe that is the quality of this book that so many people were enthralled to read it. It could also have been the history told through personal toil that was what people of the West were really interested in. I am not a real fan of that sort of literature. I did not enjoy reading Galsworthy, "The Forsthye Saga" either. They are just too mundane
It is interesting that this is a story of a philander. Yuri marries his childhood sweetheart, then finds another sweet and gentle soul to enjoy. The marriage falls apart due to social conditions and Yuri's inability to do anything for his family. At one point, he realizes he has not been much of a father to his children. It makes him sad, but there is little he can do to undo or make things better for any of them. I guess that, in the sense that a philander goes outside of his marriage to have sex for the heightened libido or something, Yuri is not like that. He truly loves his wife and Lara, seemingly equally as much. They both have the sun shining out of their root charka, as far as he is concerned. As for his last lover, there he is just trying to still be human, but his mental state is such that he fails at that and in the end abandons her.

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Love and Revolution

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Good & Bad

Like others have said, this book does a great job at depicting what Russia was like during the revolution. Otherwise, the story is really hard to get into. It's historically important, but not an enjoyable read.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10

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